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Big Society Agenda

I agree very much with the points that my hon. Friend makes. In the Stormont debate, there was recognition of exactly what she says. People have also expressed concern about the threat to the funding of those groups. What was interesting was that they were not demanding that they should be funded 100%; they were not demanding millions of pounds. Sometimes these groups want a couple of thousand pounds or a few hundred pounds just to keep them going. Then they spread out into the rest of the community and bring support and volunteers in. The Government in Westminster need to consider that. I commend to hon. Members the concordat between the voluntary and community sector and the Northern Ireland Government. Sometimes we read these documents —produced by people like us, I suppose—and we wonder what relevance they have. I think that the concordat is an extremely good document because at the end it has a commitment programme that says, ““We’re going to turn these fine words into action and this is how we’ll do it. We’ll hold people to account if it doesn’t happen.”” That provides a very good template and example for the rest of us. What I have been trying to say is that, when we debate the big society, the context is all important. If the context is some of the remarks made by me and by other Committee members, that makes it extremely difficult. The Minister is therefore struggling to explain what the big society actually is and to make it real. I will make a couple of significant points about the principles of the big society and about why it is extremely important not only in Northern Ireland but throughout the country. The most important factor about what is done by the voluntary and community sector—people can call it the big society or whatever they want—is that it can sometimes reach parts of society and of our communities that the formal structures of the state or of local government simply cannot get to. We can argue and debate why that is, but I see it in my own constituency of Nottingham, and hon. Members on both sides of the Committee will see it in theirs. Such voluntary organisations may deal with the most disaffected young person, the most antisocial family and the most difficult learning difficulty—autism has been mentioned, but there are others—and they somehow manage to connect in a way that others sometimes find difficult. If we could bottle that and distil it in such a way that we could deliver it through Departments, we would be much more successful with many of our social programmes. As well as reaching parts that we cannot reach, that sector also has the ability to restore things such as pride and morale in an area. We sometimes see areas that are in real need of regeneration and help. For some reason, millions of pounds are spent somewhere, but when that local community wants £20,000 or £30,000, it cannot get it. People therefore say, ““We will do it ourselves.”” They raise the money and undertake a restoration, which increases pride and morale. In a sense, that is what the Minister is trying to get at, but the issue is not actually about the big society; it is about how public policy deals with such matters. I have seen that in my own background, which, as many hon. Members know, is in education. It is good to have voluntary and community organisations working to raise educational achievement and aspiration in communities and to combat disillusionment, which is the sense that nothing can be done and that nothing will make any difference. As the Minister has said—to be fair—giving local communities the power to take more decisions is absolutely right. Another interesting point—this is a real problem for all Governments and for all councils—is that that approach, if it can be done properly, saves money. The Northern Ireland Council for Voluntary Action has produced a very good paper, ““Investing in Smart Solutions””, which talks about what saves money as well as actually working. It has numerous examples, but I shall read only one: ““Jobtrack is a partnership between NIACRO””— the Northern Ireland Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders— ““the Probation Board for Northern Ireland…and the Northern Ireland Prison Service… In Northern Ireland there are 1,453 individuals in prison, the rate of re-offending stands at 42.8% and the cost of imprisonment is £78,000 per prisoner per year. The Jobtrack programme has a re-offending rate of 24% and works with an average of 1,000 prisoners and ex-offenders each year…saving…£1.4million””. I am conciliatory in many respects, but I say to the Minister that if he were able to resolve the conundrum that Government and local authority accountants cannot use future savings to justify current expenditure, he would achieve a great deal. For some reason, they sometimes make an immediate budget saving, while knowing that that will cost them money down the track. Yet the fact of the matter is that, from an accountancy point of view, the system works. I have been at council meetings during which everybody said, ““That’s ridiculous—we haven’t got the money,”” and I said, ““But it’s going to cost us a fortune down the road when that young person goes to prison or something happens in that family.”” There is no way for current accounting to take account of future saving. We have wrestled with that problem for numerous years—in Northern Ireland, England, Wales and Scotland—and it is ridiculous. If the Minister really wants to make the big society count, he should find a way of ensuring that if people can demonstrate that they will save money in the future, they are allowed to have more money up front, which is called an investment to save. The Government’s principles are based on people taking control of their own lives, the decentralisation of power, more transparency and better accountability. As has been said, most of us agree with those aims, but what do they mean as an overall concept? What do they mean in terms of policy? How will it happen? In other words, how will it be translated from empty rhetoric into actual policy? As I have said, I am bipartisan in my approach to all those things, but I challenge the Government when appropriate.